European parliament election

The fact that the leaders of the 28 EU nations are not rushing to appoint Jean-Claude Juncker as the next head of the European Commission is being denounced in the European Parliament – and elsewhere – as an affront to democracy. After all, say the parliamentarians, the main pan-European parties in the European elections all nominated leading candidates (Spitzenkandidaten) – who were their standard-bearers and nominees to be head of the European Commission. The poor-old voters were told that, if the centre-right EPP came out ahead, then Mr Juncker of Luxembourg was the chosen one. The EPP have now duly emerged as the biggest bloc and yet European political leaders are not leaping to appoint Juncker. No wonder the voters are bitterly disillusioned, and Euroscepticism is on the march!

Well, that’s the argument, anyway. But it needs to be pointed out that the idea that the European electorate has just risen up – en masse – and demanded that Jean-Claude Juncker should be their leader is laughable nonsense. Read more

The fallout from the European elections
The recent European Parliament elections have transformed the continent’s political landscape. Anti-establishment parties have scored remarkable victories in countries such as France, Greece and the UK while mainstream forces have done less well. But good results for Angela Merkel’s CDU in Germany and Matteo Renzi’s Democratic Party in Italy show voters have not completely turned their backs on the EU. In this week’s podcast, Ferdinando Giugliano is joined by Tony Barber, Europe editor, Hugh Carnegy, Paris bureau chief, and Guy Dinmore, Rome correspondent, to discuss the fallout from the elections

On Thursday night, Spanish television broadcast the first and only live debate between Spain’s leading candidates for the European Parliament election. The debate itself provided few rhetorical fireworks and precious little insight, but the morning after was packed with zesty controversy.

Most commentators felt that Miguel Arias Cañete, who heads the list of Spain’s ruling Popular party, came off slightly worse in the head-to-head clash with Elena Valenciano, his Socialist opponent. Unusually for a TV debate between politicians, Mr Arias Cañete decided to read his entire opening and closing statements off a piece of paper. Shuffling his notes around for much of the night, he reverted back to pre-written text on several more occasions. It made for a slightly wooden, disjointed appearance that triggered a flood of mocking tweets and commentary.

Perhaps realising that his performance had made less of an impact than he would have hoped, Mr Arias Cañete gave a television interview on Friday morning that offered up a curious explanation for his lacklustre performance. The problem, apparently, was the fact that he was facing a woman. Read more

EU elections – the populists are coming
This week’s podcast explores the rise of Europe’s populist parties, and internal ructions over the election process for José Manuel Barroso’s successor as EU President. Peter Spiegel, Brussels bureau chief, and Tony Barber, Europe editor, join Gideon Rachman to ask whether strong polling for populist parties should be seen more as a threat to their domestic rivals or to the result of next week’s European elections. Also on the agenda is the fear that the disagreement between the European Parliament and heads of state over the process by which the next EU President will be chosen, is exactly the kind of internal standoff that gives eurosceptics justification for disengaging with EU politics

What is it about the last week of May and elections? I already have the elections to the European Parliament marked in my diary. They are scheduled to take place in 28 EU nations between May 22 and May 25, and the European Parliament has modestly billed them as the “second biggest democratic exercise in the world”. The biggest, obviously, is the Indian elections – the results of which will have been declared just a week earlier. The Indian and European elections were scheduled some time ago. But we now also have the Ukrainian presidential election - an event that has taken on global significance – scheduled to take place on May 25. Meanwhile, Egypt has just announced that it too will hold a presidential election on May 26-27. Read more

The World

with Gideon Rachman

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Welcome to the World blog. Gideon Rachman and colleagues offer commentary on international affairs.

Gideon became chief foreign affairs columnist for the Financial Times in July 2006. He joined the FT after a 15-year career at The Economist, which included spells as a foreign correspondent in Brussels, Washington and Bangkok. He also edited The Economist’s business and Asia sections.

His particular interests include American foreign policy, the European Union and globalisation